User blog:DMSwordsmaster/More Single-Player Custom Map Rambling
Oh boy, it's the sequel literally nobody asked for! So in the year past the time I made my first rambling spiel about custom maps, I've played quite a few maps past then. And I've noticed even more annoying cliches and bullshit things in maps that do very little to impress me or endear to me. As a result, I decided to plop down and make a sequel to my original rambling. So, here are more things you should/should not do in a map! Again, not like anyone would fucking read this dogshit. Again, these are all experiences I've had with maps. And again, I won't list any map names for the same reason I didn't do so in the last ramble. And lastly, a lot of my overblown swearing is mostly there for hammy effect; don't take the swearing too seriously. I'm not actually mad about these. The "In summation" bits are more accurate to my thoughts and feelings on the matter, if you want a less-sweary version of the point. :P ---- 1 - OH MY GOD FUCKING UNSKIPPABLE CUTSCENES THAT TAKE TWO OR THREE FUCKING MINUTES TO GO THROUGH I JUST WANT TO GO BACK TO FUCKING SHOOTING PEOPLE AFTER I FAIL A LEVEL Now, this isn't a rant against cutscenes in general. I'm fine with cutscenes in PB2 maps; within reason. Okay, cool, you made a camera pan around a region of a map to see certain parts of it. Cool. Any slack jawed idiot with a grasp of PB2's level editor can do the same thing. Nah, my problem is the third or fourth time I see this same goddamn cutscene that takes two fucking minutes to go through after I failed the map for any number of reasons that starts to grind my goddamn balls. Simply put, have a way to skip cutscenes. There's a fucking reason in 90% of games nowadays, there's an option to skip fucking cutscenes. Or, cutscenes just don't happen in the levels themselves. Or or, if they do, either they're skippable or they're brief. Every single goddamn time I have to sit through your stupid camera panning "I CAN MAKE COOL STUFF!" horseshit, I feel like eating my own skin whilst sitting and waiting for the stupid thing to finish. Needless to say, I'm not enjoying your map. I don't care how cool you think your cutscene is. I don't care how wonderful you think your writing is. (95% of the time, do not fucking kid yourself) HAVE AN OPTION TO SKIP THAT SHIT AND LET ME GET BACK TO THE ACTUAL GAMEPLAY. As a related note, I don't mind cutscene levels too much, because you can still technically skip them via leaving and putting in the Map ID after the cutscene map, but still, I'd just say take out the middle man and let people skip that level, too. IN SUMMATION - HAVING CUTSCENES IN MAPS IS FINE. HAVING LONG CUTSCENES IS TOLERABLE... BUT ONLY IF YOU CAN SKIP THE DAMN THINGS. HAVING TO REWATCH THE SAME CUTSCENE EVERY TIME YOU HAVE TO REDO A LEVEL KILLS ENJOYMENT AND GETS REALLY BORING REALLY FAST. ---- 2 - WHAT THE FUCK I PICKED THIS DIFFICULTY SETTING WHY AM I SUDDENLY ON THIS DIFFICULTY SETTING I WANTED TO PICK THIS DIFFICULTY SETTING TO LEARN THE MAP BEFORE I TAKE IT ON HARDER DIFFICULTIES OH MY CHRIST WHY Let me get this on the table. When I start a new map I've never played before, generally speaking, I'll pick the Easy difficulty setting. Yes, I'm being serious. Call me someone who sucks all you want (despite the fact I've beaten the entirety of PB2's campaign on Impossible difficulty and I've gotten all 23 Achievements so if you think I suck at the game you are cordially invited to feast on my shit), but when I play PB2's custom SP Maps, generally, I do so casually. As a result, I'll pick a lower difficulty in order to learn the map and such before, should I like the map and not think it's a steaming pile of pigshit, I decide to tackle it on a harder difficulty setting. This is because PB2's custom maps can literally have any sort of challenge level ranging from a well designed level with interesting enemy encounters to a fucking horribly designed glitchy gauntlet with four dozen fucking enemies placed in a straight line right in front of you with no room to dodge, take cover, or enjoy the game with a framerate that would make Microsoft PowerPoint blush. And even on the Easy difficulty setting, PB2 can be a challenging fucking game. So starting off on a lower difficulty to learn the level in an acceptable manner before throwing myself at the harder difficulties is a good way to gauge my enjoyment of a level's design and enemy placement before I decide to take them on within a harder level. So why the fuck do some mapmakers decide "Nah, fuck you, you play this on MY difficulty level, you fuckin pleb" and then lock their map to a harder difficulty setting from the word go?! It's jarring to pick one difficulty level and then suddenly be bitchslapped in the face by a spiteful designer who don't want no "CASSOOULLS" playin' their "TOTALLY WELL DESIGNED MAP"... which usually boils down to pigshit enemy spam or putting you in such disadvantageous positions that you'd have little hope of surviving even on Easy difficulty. Congrats! You locked me into a harder difficulty for your shitty map. That doesn't make it any more fun or enjoyable, and, indeed, often kills the enjoyment of your map because I've got literally no room for error dealing with AI who shoot you outside of your range and know your position despite having literally no way of knowing your location because of how PB2's camera fucking works! For God's sake, if you want your map to be challenging, design a map that's challenging! Locking the difficulty is the most artificial way of increasing challenge you could possibly do outside of just taking every enemy and copy-pasting them forty times each! Let people choose their own goddamn difficulty! There's a fucking difficulty select for a reason! IN SUMMATION - NOT EVERYONE IS AS GOOD AT PLAZMA BURST 2 AS YOU ARE. HAVE YOUR DIFFICULTY COME FROM YOUR MAP DESIGN, NOT LOCKING THE DIFFICULTY; THAT IS AN ARTIFICIAL METHOD OF INCREASING DIFFICULTY PERIOD. ---- 3 - WAIT WHAT WHY DID I FAIL THE LEVEL?? WHAT, I DID SOMETHING THE MAP MAKER DIDN'T WANT TO DESIGN AROUND AND I GOT FAILED FOR IT?! FUCK YOU!! Oh boy... This one. AKA, "I didn't want to stress-test and idiot-proof my map to any acceptable degree so I'm just gonna force a fail on you for doing something I don't like!" This isn't "Failing an objective" or "Failing a map because you killed someone you're not supposed to kill", this is literally doing something the mapmaker failed to design around the possibility of happening, and so just put in a "End mission with reason A" trigger to fuck over anyone who dares go against their "TOTALLY IMPORTANT DESIGN DECISION". Do I even need to explain why this type of map design is complete dogshit?! Oh yes, don't design your map with failsafes to stop people from doing the thing that fucks over your map, oh no. Just put up a vague signpost saying "do this thing" and then fucking fail them for not doing this thing. I totally get that, sometimes, you simply cannot 100% idiot proof a certain aspect. But in that case, you STILL have to fucking TRY. More often than not, there's a solution to your map design issue that allows you to carry on the story the way you intended without having to fucking fail somebody for stepping out of line! Simply not trying to do so at all is lazy and godawful map design, especially if you decide to fail a map and force someone to restart just because YOU were too lazy to fix your broken fucking map! You're acknowledging that your map is flawed, and are openly admitting that you didn't do a goddamn thing to try and fix it! That's not my goddamn fault, it's yours for not fucking putting any effort in designing around a flaw in your map's script! IN SUMMATION - TRIGGER AND SCRIPT-HEAVY MAPS REQUIRE IDIOT PROOFING. YOU HAVE TO PUT IN THE TIME AND EFFORT TO DESIGN AROUND THE SCRIPT OF YOUR MAP; LAZILY FAILING PEOPLE WHO MESS WITH THE SCRIPT IS A POOR AND PATHETIC WAY OF FORCING PEOPLE TO STICK TO YOUR SCRIPT. MAKING SCRIPT AND TRIGGER HEAVY MAPS REQUIRES EFFORT TO KEEP PEOPLE FROM BREAKING THEM, GODDAMN IT. ---- And there's the sequel to the rambling nobody asked for. Blah blah blah again don't take things too seriously, blah blah blah what map cliches do you hate, blah blah blah nobody will even read this. Category:Blog posts